SNL Cold Open Satirizes Trump Iran Strikes

Saturday Night Live opened its latest episode with a biting cold open sketch satirizing President Donald Trump's early morning military strikes on Iran, which reportedly killed the country's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The segment, aired on February 28, featured cast member James Austin Johnson portraying Trump in a mock press conference from Mar-a-Lago, where he justified the surprise attack launched at 2 a.m. Saturday.

Johnson's Trump began with characteristic flair, greeting viewers with "Happy World War III to all who celebrate" and touting himself as the "FIFA Peace Prize winner and Nobel Peace Prize taker." He explained the decision to strike as stemming from a meeting with his self-proclaimed "Board of Peace," which had grown "bored of peace." Trump quipped that Iran had been "two weeks away from developing a nuclear weapon for like the last 15 years or something," necessitating immediate action. "So we had to act now, and we're doing war," he declared, before adapting the lyrics of Edwin Starr's 1969 anti-war anthem: "War. What is it good for? Distracting from the Epstein files!"

The sketch highlighted the timing of the operation, noting its advantages: it...